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December 9, 2009

As if we needed another reason to *LOVE* the Weitzmeister!

Twilight fan, 22-year-old Samantha, was arrested last week and held in a cell for 2 days for allegedly trying to videotape New Moon.

Facing a 3 year jail sentence if convicted, Chris Weitz is coming to her rescue, telling the Sun Times:

He’s dismayed about Samantha Tumpach’s arrest Nov. 28 at a Rosemont movie theater on a felony charge of illegally copying his new hit film, and he’s contacted the film’s studio about his concerns.

“Needless to say, the case seems to me terribly unfair and I would like to do what I can to address this,” Weitz wrote in an e-mail.

Tumpach told the Sun-Times last week that she was taping parts of her sister’s surprise 29th birthday party celebrated at the Muvico Theater — including her and other family members singing “Happy Birthday.”

The three minutes of footage she shot inside the theater, Tumpach said, also included film previews and ads, along with short segments of the film — and her talking about the camera and the movie.

“It was never my intention to record the movie,” Tumpach said. “You can hear me talking the whole time.”

Weitz questioned whether her arrest was justified.

“There is, needless to say, a difference between trying to protect the copyright of a film and making an unfair example of someone who clearly seems not to have any intentions towards video piracy,” Weitz wrote.

He said he had contacted the studio that released the film, Summit Entertainment, to express his concern about her arrest, but he acknowledged there’s probably little he can do to influence the outcome of her case.

“I am not sure what effect I would have on the case,” he wrote, noting “the film is, after all, not my property.”

8 comments:

Ultimately, I think it's Summit's decision over whether or not to press charges, since the films are technically Summit's property, but I hope this helps that girl out. It's not like she was taping the ENTIRE film or worse, distributing it for money.